Beth

Finally stopped by Beth at Casuarina Road for dinner. It's meant to be a cafe with decent Italian fare. This restaurant is a culmination of Amanda and Alex's efforts from PÁAN, and realizing their dream and love of cooking. It opened in July and at two months old, they're still figuring out the operations even as they've  gotten the flavors of their food right.

We ordered three items. An appetizer, a main and a side. It was odd that the main of a risotto arrived first, way before the ermmm appetizers, and finally the side. Okaaaaay. I'm not too particular about it since it's a casual cafe. 

Our main of squash risotto with hazelnuts and figs was decent. It's not what I fully expect of a squash risotto, but it's adequate. It's 'homey'. They could afford to be more stingy with the balsamic, which over-powers the delicate squash and figs. That balsamic was supposed to be a reduction, and at this amount, it ended up being really tart. I ending up eating around the circle of balsamic. Heheh. 

Then the appetizer of beef carpaccio and peppers arrived. I had to laugh. It came as a giant heap. The presentation is totally meant as a filling for sandwiches or to be placed on bread. The flavors were on point. The side dish finally got here, piping out. Okaaaay. The beef tripe was beautifully braised, and the pesto that it came with was excellent. It's hard not to wash these down with focaccia. They brought out two slices for us. The bread was good.

The menu is limited, but not bad at all. There will be something for everyone. There're two types of pasta, which sounded really friendly. I'll have one of those the next time. I think I'll stick to sandwiches here. They have superb sammies. Their sandwiches and hotcakes are on the menu till 5pm.

The kitchen was sweet to also trot out a complimentary scoop of Sicilian gelato for us. That was right up the man's alley. He loves pistachio gelato. I was surprised by how much I enjoyed the dessert! I do eat dessert, but they must be what I'm looking for, say Beth's offerings of a olive oil cake with mulberry sorbet with mascarpone cream. Forget about the cream, I couldn't be bothered with that. It was the olive oil cake that I totally appreciated, and the mulberry sorbet was soooo surprisingly good.